Rayla Freeman

Rayla is passionate about changing education to fit all types of students and to help people reach and surpass their limitations. She was the drama president of her high school and finds that the creativity and expression she found in drama sparked her desire to reshape education. Rayla thinks it’s important to reexamine how we raise our younger generations in order to take the reins of our future. Rayla hopes to improve her language skills, change her perspective, and immerse herself in Senegalese culture. Her favorite quote is, “It's like everyone tells a story about themselves inside their own head. Always. All the time. That story makes you what you are. We build ourselves out of that story. And not only hopes to improve her own story while abroad, but the stories of others as well." - Patrick Rothfuss

I have cried in your arms and taken respite from many a’ hard day there Spent nights in your embrace Willling myself to be strong I have cried again I have fallen apart I have felt alone and when I finally couldn’t cry anymore I…

“Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new.” Albert Einstein Something I do a lot of in Senegal is make mistakes. I don’t greet someone accidentally (which can be a huge social slip-up). I forget people’s names on a daily basis…

Home. “Everyone in the world was programmed by the place they were born, hemmed in by their beliefs, but you had to at least try to grow your own brain. Otherwise, you might as well be living on a reservation, worshipping a bunch of bogus…

Some of these lessons I should have understood before now, but it’s very humbling to admit that I am just starting to learn them and to really understand them now. I will probably learn most of these lessons again in the future, but for now…

Disclaimer – I wrote this about a month ago, when everything was a little bit different. While the contents of this blog are the same as they have been, there was a small period of time where I felt that maybe fear would interfere with…